


Unresolved

by halfpastmonsoon



Category: Ookiku Furikabutte | Big Windup!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Childhood Trauma, Conflict, Conflict Resolution, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Fluffy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Internal Conflict, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Memories, Repressed Memories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-11
Updated: 2018-04-11
Packaged: 2019-04-21 16:23:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14288811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halfpastmonsoon/pseuds/halfpastmonsoon
Summary: Kanou wakes up to a weeping noise in the middle of the night and ends up wrapped up in a conversation about the unresolved past





	Unresolved

Kanou woke up.

There would have been nothing weird about this, if not for the fact it was 2:40 in the morning.

He sat up in complete silence and listened. There is no way he misheard. There was only one thing capable of waking him up instantly. He put his hand over his heart. It was beating so fast…yeah, there’s no way nothing is wrong.  
He sat on the edge of his bed and looked at the other one across the room. Or rather, he squinted at the darkness where, he supposed, it was hidden. He heard it again. A soft and quiet noise that alarmed him in his sleep.

He stood up as noiselessly as he could and tip-toed across the room, carefully and slowly to avoid just running into the other bed. He paused mid-step because the noise was heard again, this time louder and more pained. Oh no. He knelt down and continued his journey like that. His eyes were getting used to the darkness and he could make out the shape in front of him.  
The figure lying on it was curled up into a fetal position, but with the face mostly hidden in the pillow. Kanou’s heart dropped. He wasn’t sure if he should sit on the bed, if he should touch the sobbing head, or if he should stay where he was.

It’d only happened once before.

Kanou and Mihashi had been living together for a bit over a month. It was great to be back together after such a long period of separation, but it wasn’t exactly easy. They had to relearn each other, after all. Both had new experiences from the time when they were apart. And there were also side effects of junior high that Kanou never got to experience before. Mihashi had grown a lot, but the trauma was still there, even if its roots were so far away, so long ago.

Kanou wasn’t the kind of person who would let things affect him negatively for long. After initial grief, he always focused on new goals and new experiences. All he preserved of the past was positive – childhood memories still made him smile constantly.   
Then again, it’s not like he had ever been hurt as deeply as Mihashi.

When they moved in together, they established some rules. Perhaps not rules, per se, but comfortable conditions of coexistence. Kanou insisted on that, since he himself was flexible and didn’t need much, but he wanted to make sure Mihashi is absolutely comfortable living with him. One of the results was that they had two beds. Sometimes they slept together, and sometimes separately. Sometimes, both of those happened during the same night. Kanou was ready to sleep together in one bed whenever, but he knew Mihashi might sometimes prefer to sleep by himself for whatever reason – heat, some sort of anxiety, anything really. At times, Mihashi would feel hot in the evening, but somehow wake up next to Kanou in the morning. It didn’t matter.

Kanou decided to risk sitting on the edge of the bed. He looked at Mihashi with certain curiosity. Would he go back to peaceful sleep or wake up on his own? Perhaps it’d be a good idea to gently nudge him or something. The only experience Kanou had had with people having nightmares was his own little brother, which was definitely different from Mihashi, now or ever in the past. He could risk it, though.

‘Ren…’ he whispered while gently running his fingers through Mihashi’s hair. He barely touched it at first. The last thing he wanted was scared Mihashi in the middle of the night, scared because of his actions.

Kanou felt movement under his fingers and paused instantly, waiting anxiously, holding his breath.  
Mihashi twitched and slowly rolled around. Kanou could now see his face, worryingly shiny in the darkness.  
Mihashi opened his eyes and looked around in confusion. He sat up and rubbed his eyes, still obviously wet.   
Oh no.

‘Shuu-chan…’ he mumbled, still looking a bit lost ‘I…did I…wake you up?’ he gulped ‘…Again? What…time is it…’  
‘Ren, are you alright?’ he knew nothing is alright here, technically. They should both be asleep until at least six in the morning, yet it was closer to three, for starters. Kanou put his hand on Mihashi’s shoulder and sat more comfortably now that he didn’t have to worry about waking him up.

Mihashi looked at him, mouth open in a triangular shape, his eyes red and still wet. Kanou shuddered. Whatever this was, he needed to know what put him in such a state. The subject of his thoughts pouted and nodded his head really fast, adding ‘I-I’m fine’ afterwards. Fine, my ass.  
‘Ren, you were crying. Was that a nightmare?’ there was no concern in his voice, only practical curiosity. That’s not to say he wasn’t worried, though. It just was no time to express that. He needed to know what happened before he could let himself react emotionally in any way.

Kanou rubbed his eyes and yawned before sitting a bit closer to Mihashi. Now their knees were touching. Somehow, that felt really safe. They still weren’t really used to physical contact, ever since they became distant sometime in middle school. They could hold hands sometimes, and Kanou managed to bring himself to ruffle Mihashi’s hair from time to time. But everything was still a bit confusing to them both. Knees or feet touching somehow felt like just the right and troubleless physical connection.

It was different while sleeping, though. Intimacy sure works in strange ways.

‘I…’ Mihashi’s voice snapped Kanou out of his contemplation and brought him back to the reality of 3am on a Thursday, in the small apartment, in Mihashi’s bed, with teary-eyed Mihashi in front of him. Kanou leaned forward a bit and focused entirely on Mihashi. ‘I-it was a…dream…of middle school…’  
Kanou frowned. This needed no further explanation. Whatever it was he dreamed about exactly, the effect wasn’t surprising at all. He scratched the back of his head. He will probably have to say something about this. Worse still, he will have to say the right thing.  
‘I…’ Mihashi gulped and Kanou expected the worst from the upcoming sentence ‘It was…my fault that we kept…losing…both in the dream and…in reality. And…’ Kanou noticed tears forming in the corners of his eyes and his heart dropped, but before he could say anything, Mihashi continued ‘it was not just…a dream…it was a…memory.’ Mihashi frowned and looked down, letting the tears roll down his cheeks.

Kanou ran his fingers through his dark, messy fringe, trying to find the energy to help the situation. It’s not like he didn’t suspect the whole thing will keep resurfacing, no matter how often he reassured him nothing is his fault and everything is fine. He sometimes wished Mihashi believed everything he told him, instead of everything negative he’d had to hear from people.  
‘You never did anything wrong, though,’ he said as calmly as possible, ‘in the dream or in reality.’  
‘That’s not true!’ Mihashi snapped and covered his mouth on instinct. Kanou was taken aback for a moment, just blinking, his mouth agape with surprise. ‘I…’ the smaller boy added, less loudly this time ‘I was selfish and…I ruined it for everyone and…’ he looked Kanou straight in the eyes, his hands balled into fists in front of him ‘and I never let you be the ace…even though you…deserved that!’  
Kanou grabbed his wrists and leaned forward so their foreheads were almost touching. ‘You deserved to be the ace and that’s why you were one. I was fine! I really didn’t mind! You were skilled enough to be the ace, and I had no reason to be disappointed!’ his grip tightened before he let go of Mihashi’s hands, just to let his own turn into fists as well. ‘Why don’t you believe me when I say I never minded that!’ he was practically yelling at this point, which wasn’t a wise idea at such an hour.

He didn’t think about it, though.

Mihashi looked at him surprisingly calmly, his hands still in the same position. He blinked a few times, before finally blurting out ‘you should mind, though, Shuu-chan.’  
‘Huh?’ Kanou opened his eyes, which were closed since the moment he yelled. ‘What do you mean?’  
‘I was selfish. I learned that, when I was in Nishiura. I should have…let you play…at least from time to time…I shouldn’t have…been this way. It wasn’t good for either of us.’  
‘But you were better than me!’ Kanou objected instantly ‘And I practiced on my own, so it’s not like I wasn’t playing at all-’ he paused, realising the whole argument is something they shouldn’t even be talking about at this age.  
‘Shuu-chan…were you really ok with that or…or did you just…get used to it?’  
‘I…’ now that he thought about it, there was probably a moment of disappointment, at the very beginning. After that, he made the best of what he was given. And he was really proud of Mihashi, Mihashi himself, not Mihashi as part of the team. So perhaps it’s not as simple as he remembered.  
‘I think…’ Mihashi started ‘that you…forgave me too easily, Shuu-chan. I mean…if you were playing, maybe the team…would not…have lost every game…’  
‘You always think about yourself being useful to the team…and not about the team helping YOU. That’s a problem, Ren.’  
‘I am…part of a team, Shuu-chan. That’s…how it should be. Even if…you can do great things…it doesn’t matter if…it doesn’t let the team win.’

Kanou noticed he and Mihashi were both half-asleep and not exactly in the best shape. Was that really the conversation to be had at three in the morning? Then again, Mihashi had a point.

He definitely did.

That’s what worried him the most about this.

Perhaps his judgement was off. And perhaps he was supposed to feel angry, back then. And perhaps he was thinking too much about how unfair the team was towards Mihashi, instead of thinking about how unfair the situation was for him.

That didn’t matter now, though.

‘Ren, I get what you’re saying, and you’re right. But it doesn’t matter now. I can’t change how much experience I have, and I guess you can’t stop feeling guilty about it. But it’s okay. It’s okay.’ He yawned into his hand, the other one resting on his knee. ‘I didn’t spend so much time telling everyone you’re amazing to decide I should be mad at you five years later.’ He looked at Mihashi’s face for some time, his hand still covering his mouth. ‘I will acknowledge that I might have been too agreeable though, okay?’ He chuckled at his own words. That wasn’t really the most fortunate wording, but he was tired and it didn’t matter. Mihashi nodded, a small smile on his face. Thank God.  
‘I hope you’re not gonna have more nightmares about this. It doesn’t matter anymore, Ren. Is there anything else you wanted to say?’ He always preferred to ask, just in case. He could sometimes get too caught up in his own speeches, and he never wanted Mihashi to feel like he can’t talk too.

He put a finger to his mouth and looked at the ceiling. So there is something…?

Before he could even wonder what it might be, Mihashi’s arms were wrapped around his shoulders, his mouth next to Kanou’s ear.

‘I’m sorry for waking you up, Shuu-chan,’ he whispered after a moment ‘could I…?’ he didn’t finish the question, but Kanou nodded his head anyway. Carefully, he got up with Mihashi in his arms, wrapped around his neck. He plopped down onto his own bed, Mihashi still resting on his shoulder sleepily.  
‘Hey, Shuu-chan…’ he mumbled, and Kanou murmured ‘hmmm?’ in response.  
‘I…love you…’ was the reply, whispered into his shoulder, barely audible.

Kanou heard it, though.

And while Mihashi was already asleep, he was still lying half-awake with a big grin on his face.


End file.
